N002556
VIA FACSIMILE
January 22, 2002
Kenneth Feinberg, Special Master
Aviation Victims' Compensation Fund
78 Third Avenue
Suite 2202
New York, NY 10017
Dear Mr. Feinberg:
Regarding the proposed salary formula for the Aviation Victims' Compensation Fund, one of
our members who perished in the World Trade Center has a circumstance which if not
addressed would negatively impact her family's compensation. The victims, the mother of three-
year-old twins, and her husband had made a decision that while the children were young, she
would work a reduced schedule. Her employer the Port Authority had a "job-sharing"
arrangement wherein she worked only twenty hours a week. To the best of my understanding,
prior to the children's birth she had worked a forty-hour traditional full-time schedule. If the
formula does not take into account this was not a permanent situation and after the children
are older she would have returned to a forty-hour schedule doubling her current earnings, the
base for her calculation will be half of what she would have earned once returned to the full
time schedule.
In addition to this particular situation, we do have concerns over the disparity in the final
payout when using the proposed formula that relies on the current earnings as the base. It is
hard to imagine that there could be such a wide margin in the compensation for a
"stockbroker" and one of our victims who may have left small children behind. The impact on
the families is the same: they have lost a person who is in the long and short run irreplaceable,
Each family should receive the help they need and be justly compensated.
As one of our surviving spouses said, there is no way to really make this right, but having
financial burdens relieved goes a long way to start. He is currently not working as a result of
his wife's death, so he can be with his three year old twins to allow all three of them to heal.
So in this circumstance, not only have they been deprived of their loved one and her earning
power, they have been deprived of his earnings as well. And as we all know, once you get off
the "career track" it is difficult to get back on and make up those years lost.
I hope these concerns will be considered when the final determinations are made on the
distribution of funds. If you have any questions regarding this, please contact me at
or via email at
Sincerely,
COMMUNICATIONS WORKERS OF AMERICA
AFL-CIO, CLC
Women's Activities and Community Service
Washington, DC